


Fraying Ends of Conversation

by Kalael



Series: Hold your hand 'til the colors fade [4]
Category: Rise of the Guardians (2012)
Genre: M/M, Reincarnation AU
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-11-21
Updated: 2013-11-21
Packaged: 2018-01-02 05:12:38
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 509
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1052902
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kalael/pseuds/Kalael
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Things changed when Kozmotis remembered and Jack didn't.</p><p>"Would remembering make you love me more?"</p>
            </blockquote>





	Fraying Ends of Conversation

It's only when they are half asleep that they can have this conversation. During the day they are too busy, their interactions kept to texts and the occasional lunch date until they are home again in the evening. Once this was enough. Once these fleeting moments were paradise, glimpses into the perfect life that they were trying to carve out for one another.

Things changed when Kozmotis remembered and Jack didn't.

"Have you had any dreams?" Kozmotis asks, his hand resting lightly on Jack's hip. They are facing one another in bed, Jack's knees curled towards his chest and pressing lightly against Kozmotis' stomach. Kozmotis only touches Jack above the sheets, layers of cloth separating Jack from the contact he wants but can’t seem to ask for. There’s always a barrier between them, these days.

"I haven't." Jack says. He wants to sound regretful or bitter but his voice rings painfully hollow in his own ears. "I don't dream at all."

"You will eventually." Kozmotis tells him confidently. Jack closes his eyes and shakes his head.

"You don't know that. I might never remember. Even after all this, I haven't had a single dream. I haven't remembered any of it." Kozmotis had, of course, told him about the dreams. About every life and every ending and every single failure. Jack believes him, enough to realize that this is their failure this time around. This is their ending.

"We have to have faith." Kozmotis presses his hand into Jack’s hip but the touch is muffled through the cloth and it feels like an omen, this subconscious barrier that Kozmotis keeps putting between them. Jack straightens his legs, no longer touching Kozmotis at all.

"No, you have to let go. You're banking everything on something that might never happen." He tells him, but Kozmotis just frowns and pulls his hand away.

"You shouldn't be so pessimistic about this." He pushes, as if through words alone he can make Jack remember the things that he does. They’ve tried. They’ve tried everything and nothing seems to work. Jack stares unblinking into Kozmotis’ face.

"Would remembering make you love me more?" He asks. Kozmotis’ determined expression falters. There is a sharp moment of silence, painful enough that it cuts Jack through, and he knows that the fraying ends of their conversation have nothing left to bind them.

"Jack, how could you even say something like that?" Kozmotis’ question is a tremulous whisper but it’s unbearable loud in their dark bedroom, hanging between them like lead.

"Because I know I'm not enough as I am." Jack says plainly, and the stricken look on Kozmotis' face is all he needs for an answer. He has his confirmation.

Jack turns away, smearing tears across his pillow. Kozmotis shifts behind him as if to embrace him, but they remain on opposite sides of the bed with no physical contact between them. In the morning Jack slips away unnoticed and Kozmotis wakes to an empty home, uncertain of whether or not Jack will be returning.

Jack isn't certain, either.


End file.
